New Hard Drives

OrangeWolf

Gawd
Joined
Jan 6, 2011
Messages
884
I could use some help selecting new hard drives (and possibly answering a few other questions).

Background
I made a similar thread months ago, with the intention of buying/upgrading then, but two car wrecks and a relative in the hospital and... yeah, it didn't happen. I've been using my Thinkpad since then.

Current Build - Phenom II x4 965, Radeon 6850 1GB, 8GB DDR3 RAM, Corsair 650 TX PSU, HAF 912 Case, & ASUS M4A87TD/USB3 6Gb/s ATX AMD Motherboard

Basically the hard drive died over a year ago, and for various reasons I haven't fixed it. My original plan had been to upgrade in 2015 to a new rig, but I think I'll put that off another year. I'm ready to buy right now, so there won't be any more putting this off hopefully.

What I want - Two hard drives. One large one for storage and one smaller (250ish) SSD for programs. I want to use these in my next build, so even if they're overkill for the current rig they hopefully won't be when I build a new one. I've got a solid job now and a bit more money than I had back in 2011 (graduate school at the time).

Money... isn't a huge issue. I don't want to go off the deep end, but I'm thinking $400 for two hard drives should be far more than needed (no need to max out the budget).

SSD - I've heard the current 'ones to pick from' are the Samsung 850 Pro, Intel 730, and Crucial MX200. Is that right? It looks like I can get the 250gb for any of those for <$150, which is quite reasonable. Or I could get the BX100 (step down I think) 500gb for $200.

Whats the suggestion there? How big a difference is there between the BX100 and the Samsung 850 Pro? Whether or not I notice on this machine, would I notice on a nicer one I build next year?

Problem, Help! - I'm new to this whole computer building thing. This rig that I put together on a budget in 2011 is the only one I've ever messed with. These SSDs are all 2.5" instead of 3.5", and I'm not sure now that's supposed to work. I think my HAF 912 case came with some rails or something to make an adjustment, but I don't know how that works or if it did or not. And is this SSD going to come with a SATA cable or am I going to need to purchase that somewhere else?

Hard Drive - I'd honestly prefer a 4gb. I intend for my next build to be smaller than the HAF 912 case, and I'm not sure if I'll get one that can fit 3 hard drives. Someone in the other thread suggested the Deskstar NAS, which can be had in the 4gb version for $162 (reasonable!)

Another friend suggested this one: Seagate Bare Drive

I assume I'll be able to re-purpose the SATA cable from my current (broken) hard drive for this one?

I've got to sort out a better external storage option sometime soon too. I've got an old WD passport and that's all the backup I have. :(

Thanks in advance for any help! I might be over thinking things, but it's hard not to when I always feel so out of my depth making these purchases.
 
As an Amazon Associate, HardForum may earn from qualifying purchases.
Go with 250gb 850 evo ($100), or 500gb 850 evo ($200) (I use a 250gb for my OS drive)

The seagate your friend suggested is fine (I use the 3tb version).

Yes you can re-use SATA cable.

Keep a back up drive. if you get the 250gb SSD you can fit a new external HDD in your budget.

Use DiskInfo or HDSentinel Pro Portable once in a while, they may help warn you of incoming disk failure.
 
Thanks! Why the EVO instead of the Pro?

Is it going to come with a cable?

I'll keep using my current backup drive until I build a new rig probably, then upgrade that along with everything else. Unless there's a specific great deal atm. I might actually want to make my own and use raid for a more secure backup, but I'd have to learn how to do that first.

Thanks ^^
 
As for SSDs, I'd in general recommend you to stay away from Sandforce based SSDs as compatibility and overall performance seems to very quite a bit. EVO doesn't have a very good track record so I'd avoid these as well. Marvell based SSDs are solid and performs well given the price, no real issues at all with these. That said, I'd look at these...

Plextor PX-256M6Pro ~150$
Micron M600 256GB ~140$
SAMSUNG 850 PRO 256Gb ~180$

As for HDDs you'll hear a lot of different opinions. I've had great experience with Toshiba's DT01ACA-series, good pricing, decent performance and non crippled SMART stats. Seagate's consumer drives doesn't seem that great these days irregardless of series but that's just my impression. If you want as fast as possible you should probably look at WD Black but I've seen these act up in strange ways so I'm a bit wary of those.
//Danne
 
Thanks! Yeah, not worried about speed (like the WD black) for the HDD. Anything I need to run fast (OS, programs, 2x games max) I'll put on the SSD.
 
Thanks! Why the EVO instead of the Pro?

Is it going to come with a cable?

I'll keep using my current backup drive until I build a new rig probably, then upgrade that along with everything else. Unless there's a specific great deal atm. I might actually want to make my own and use raid for a more secure backup, but I'd have to learn how to do that first.

Thanks ^^


Basically the differences between the Evo and the Pro:

Slightly more space on a Pro.
Slightly higher write performance on a Pro.
Longer warranty.

Realistically though, for most people's purposes, the drives are interchangeable.

The drives don't come with a cable.

Also, you'll run into drive snobbery too. I'm one of them.
I don't normally recommend Seagate hard drives. I *do* recommend their SSHD (Hybrid drive) line though for people who don't want to/can't buy a straight up SSD+HD combo.

Within your budget, this is how I'd go:

850 Evo 500GB
http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-2-5-Inch-Internal-MZ-75E500B-AM/dp/B00OBRE5UE

Western Digital Green 5TB Drive
www.amazon.com/Green-5TB-Desktop-Hard-Drive/dp/B00LO3KMAK

If taxes bring you up over your $400 budget, step down to the Western Digital Green 4TB
http://www.amazon.com/Green-4TB-Desktop-Hard-Drive/dp/B00EHBEUZO
 
As an Amazon Associate, HardForum may earn from qualifying purchases.
Also, you'll run into drive snobbery too. I'm one of them.
I don't normally recommend Seagate hard drives. I *do* recommend their SSHD (Hybrid drive) line though for people who don't want to/can't buy a straight up SSD+HD combo.

Within your budget, this is how I'd go:

850 Evo 500GB
http://www.amazon.com/Samsung-2-5-Inch-Internal-MZ-75E500B-AM/dp/B00OBRE5UE

Western Digital Green 5TB Drive
www.amazon.com/Green-5TB-Desktop-Hard-Drive/dp/B00LO3KMAK

If taxes bring you up over your $400 budget, step down to the Western Digital Green 4TB
http://www.amazon.com/Green-4TB-Desktop-Hard-Drive/dp/B00EHBEUZO

Drive snobbery and you recommend WD Greens?

Get the 5TB Toshiba instead: http://www.amazon.com/Toshiba-7200rpm-3-5-Inch-Internal-PH3400U-1I72/dp/B00OP2PKHW/
 
As an Amazon Associate, HardForum may earn from qualifying purchases.
I read somewhere that drives over 3-4tb in size weren't as reliable these days for some reason, is there any truth to that? Regardless that looks awesome. I could even bump up to the 6tb one if I went with the smaller ssd.

Good recs by the way, thanks. But I'm not looking to max out my budget, just stay within it. I'm tempted to get the 850 EVO though in 500gb, if I really wouldn't ever notice the difference between that and the Pro (remember this is planned to be moved to a much better rig after another year or so).

But yes, awesome, much appreciated. Uh... I'd need to get a what, 6 Gb/s cable? Like this? I assume they're all going to work with my mobo?

Again, sorry for all the stupid questions.
 
If you want a good drive on a budget then look into Micron BX100 or their upscale 200 line.

Bulk storage, I've been running 4 HGST NAS in my main system for over a year, rock solid.

They are constantly on sale, the 3TB has come down in price thanks to their 5/6TB coming out not long ago.

Currently 4TB is $164 but can go around $150 if you catch a sale.

Cables, nothing has been confirmed you can't get full SATAIII speeds on a II cable.
Some say it's just marketing. I can't confirm that.

You can find people selling Asus III cables in packs on ebay for pretty cheap, like 5 bucks.
 
I read somewhere that drives over 3-4tb in size weren't as reliable these days for some reason, is there any truth to that?

I think you're referring to the concerns about using large drives in RAID5. Some time back there was a research paper arguing that if you use large (>1TB) drives in a RAID5 array the risk of encountering a second error during a rebuild after a disk failure may be unacceptably high. RAID6 or similar solutions with additional redundancy are preferred for large drives. Since you're only talking about a single hard drive + SSD in this system I assume that you don't mind restoring from your backup if necessary. You could easily add another hard drive at some point and make a RAID1 array for redundancy. That way you wouldn't lose anything new since your last backup in the event of a drive failure. You'd still need an external backup.

Nobody here can give you real reliability info since we don't have thousands of drives to test. I've been running 8x 3TB Seagate ST3000DM001's since 2013 without issues even though they aren't thought to be particularly reliable. If I were buying a single drive today I'd probably go with that 5TB Toshiba ND40oz linked to.

As for the SSD, Samsung had some issues with the 840 EVO line which now appear to have been fixed after a couple firmware updates. The 850s look fine so far. They're fast and consistent drives. The EVO line is fine for your needs. Kingston's new Phison-based HyperX Savage drives also seem to be quite good. I've never had any issues with the cheaper Sandforce-based Kingston V300 drives in client machines, their Sandforce implementation seemed to be better than anyone else.

You don't need special SATA cables for SATA 6GB/s. You can buy brackets to mount 2.5" SSDs/HDDs in a 3.5" bay for $5-10 if your drive or case doesn't include one.
 
Last edited:
As an Amazon Associate, HardForum may earn from qualifying purchases.
FYI i am unsure if anyone mentioned this but Skymont i think does come out July so if you made it this far you might want to wait or at least wait til June for energy efficient Broadwell.

For the SSDsjust use camelcamelcamel.com to put a price watch on the Sandisk Extreme Pro, Intel 730, and Samsung 850 Pro. Which ever drops to the price per dollar you want get that one. I would go with either of those 3 over the crucial just because they tend to be better. (unsure on the Intel 730 but you mentioned it so i just included it)
 
I read somewhere that drives over 3-4tb in size weren't as reliable these days for some reason, is there any truth to that? Regardless that looks awesome. I could even bump up to the 6tb one if I went with the smaller ssd.

Good recs by the way, thanks. But I'm not looking to max out my budget, just stay within it. I'm tempted to get the 850 EVO though in 500gb, if I really wouldn't ever notice the difference between that and the Pro (remember this is planned to be moved to a much better rig after another year or so).

But yes, awesome, much appreciated. Uh... I'd need to get a what, 6 Gb/s cable? Like this? I assume they're all going to work with my mobo?

Again, sorry for all the stupid questions.


Bigger drives mean that you have the potential to lose more if the drive fails.
Also, in a RAID situation, you run a greater chance of encountering an unrecoverable error during an array rebuild.

Honestly? I'd recommend a larger SSD and a slightly smaller hard drive.
On a workstation, a 250GB drive can get a bit cramped over time. 500GB gives you lots of spare space.

And, honestly, I doubt you'll miss the extra space on the hard drive. And, by the time you do, the price of the larger drives should have come down to something more reasonable.
 
And I won't, EVER, give Toshiba money for ANYTHING.

The theory is this Toshiba drive is made with IP that designed Hitachi drives before they became HGST.
 
@ DeathFromBelow
All previous models in the EVO have issues...

@ Chas
Firstly, anyone sane wouldn't even touch green drives with a stick... You can find a lot of info regarding issues with these drives. What you have against Toshiba is pointless unless you can give at least a decent argument.

@ OrangeWolf
From what I understand some Toshiba drives are "genuine Hitachi" while others are WD(/HGST) design so you might want to look into that for a particular model.
All drives dies, it's just a matter of time. Even if you go for a RAID array or a single drive you should always backup important files offsite. However 3+ HDDs in general seems to have a shorter life span than smaller drives in general. 256Gb will be more than enough btw...
//Danne
 
With a 500GB SSD, the hard drive is basically storage. It's not like he needs a Black drive for that.

And I won't, EVER, give Toshiba money for ANYTHING.

No one is saying to buy an overpriced black. We're saying don't spend more on the worst WD drive available, the Green when you can get the better performing, more reliable Toshiba for cheaper.

The theory is this Toshiba drive is made with IP that designed Hitachi drives before they became HGST.

There's no theory about it, Toshiba purchased Hitachi's 3.5" drive business during the WD buyout of Hitachi. They're straight out of the Hitachi factories using the Hitachi IP which was all licensed to Toshiba by WD.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/5635/...e-business-to-toshiba-complete-hitachi-buyout
 
Why I say theory is at the time of the sale there was no 5TB Hitachi drive in production. Although I assume it was in development and that was part of the IP that Toshiba received.
 
Last edited:
@ Chas
Firstly, anyone sane wouldn't even touch green drives with a stick... You can find a lot of info regarding issues with these drives. What you have against Toshiba is pointless unless you can give at least a decent argument.

As I said. Drive snobbery. Even from me.

As for Toshiba. I've had to deal with Toshiba's support staff. Never again. I'd rather straddle a running chainsaw than give them any money again.
 
No one is saying to buy an overpriced black. We're saying don't spend more on the worst WD drive available, the Green when you can get the better performing, more reliable Toshiba for cheaper.

I didn't recommend it for performance. It's bulk storage. Nothing more.
 
Sounds great guys. Looks like I'll be going with the following:

Samsung 850 EVO 500gb OR Samsung 850 Pro 256gb
Toshiba 4tb HDD
SATA III generic cable

Here's two pictures... is this what I need to convert from 3.5" to 2.5" in the drive bay for the SSD? If so I'm golden. If not I'll buy the one linked to above. Thanks so much.

ldVeF8mm.jpg

xIQbv7Gm.jpg


Now I can't wait for 2016 so I can rebuilt completely with these two drives, Skylake, DDR4 RAM, and Windows 10.
 
As an Amazon Associate, HardForum may earn from qualifying purchases.
OrangeWolf, That is the right part to put an SSD in a 3.5" bay. I have a couple of those same looking ones that came with my Coolermaster HAF-932 case.
My current machine is running a Crucial MX100 512GB SSD and a WD 4TB Black. I chose the black mainly since I like the Black's performance as well as the 5 year warranty. I also have a lot of games on it, since I can't fit everything on the SSD.
SSD just has certain games with the bulk of them on the 4TB.
 
@ OrangeWolf
You should have a look at the Plextor or Micron SSDs mentioned instead of the EVO in cased you missed those I mentioned earlier.
//Danne
 
No worries Diizzy, I got the information all written down. Consulting with a friend first, though I lean towards the Samsung because I'd heard of it before.

Thanks much. To all of you.

Pulling the trigger tomorrow. Since I'm not changing my mobo my legit cd key should work, which I have, and things should be well. ^^
 
Actually, as long as your current HDD isn't too full and the data can fit into the size of the SSD you don't necessarily NEED to reinstall (though that'll give you a cleaner system to work with).

You can copy your existing system image to the SSD.
 
Exactly.

A clean install will usually get you faster boot times. And that's about it.
So, if you're going BIOS to Logon in 20 seconds instead of 15, who gives a shit?
 
Actually, as long as your current HDD isn't too full and the data can fit into the size of the SSD you don't necessarily NEED to reinstall (though that'll give you a cleaner system to work with).

You can copy your existing system image to the SSD.

What? I'm buying because my current HDD failed over a year ago and I haven't been able to use the rig at all. I'm assuming you can't copy an image from a dead drive.
 
Because alignment gets messed up as transfer apps doesn't work on a file system level or at least didn't last time I checked.
//Danne
 
What? I'm buying because my current HDD failed over a year ago and I haven't been able to use the rig at all. I'm assuming you can't copy an image from a dead drive.

Ah!

I missed that part.

Yeah. If you have a dead HD, then a clean install isn't just your best option. It's your ONLY option.

:cool:
 
Because alignment gets messed up as transfer apps doesn't work on a file system level or at least didn't last time I checked.
//Danne

On my laptop, I cloned my original Win7 install to an SSD.

Exactly zero issues with it.
 
Because alignment gets messed up as transfer apps doesn't work on a file system level or at least didn't last time I checked.
//Danne

Acronis and Reflect can both do it. Its a moot point though. I saw Chas's post and forgot OrangeWolf mentioned the original drive was dead.
 
Which usually is a bad idea, reinstall and do it properly
//Danne

Because alignment gets messed up as transfer apps doesn't work on a file system level or at least didn't last time I checked.
//Danne

All the systems in my sig have been cloned at least 1 time and I have Zero issues.
My main rig, garage pc, and htpc are all running original Windows 7 installs from August of 2009. Swapped hardware, cloned drives and no issues at all.
If it were 1 machine you could say I was lucky, but it's 3 machines and a Laptop all cloned and all working great.
I've cloned well over a few dozen other machines as well with no problems either.

If the OP's system drive was still working, I'd recommend cloning as it's much much faster than re-installing windows 7. It takes 3+ hours to install and update windows, updating takes most of the time.
Cloning a 80-100GB OS drive takes 15 - 20 minutes using a USB cable on the drive.
I just did my fathers drive last week when he upgraded to a 256GB SSD.
 
Pulled the trigger.

Samsumg 850 Pro 256gb - $143
Toshiba 4tb HDD - $130
3-Pack SATA Cables - $8
Total (w/tax & 2-day shipping) - $294

So nice coming in under max budget ($400) and nailing my preferred budget ($300).

Thanks for the help all! If I have any trouble getting it set up I'm sure I'll be back. I have my OS key (should still work b/c mobo is the same), and I have an ISO somewhere for Windows. I'll get that put onto a flash drive and hopefully things will go smoothly. I shouldn't have to wait to hook up the HDD til after I've installed or anything right? IIRC you get to select where the OS installs if you have more than one drive available.

Cheers!
 
As an Amazon Associate, HardForum may earn from qualifying purchases.
So, you have no idea what I just wrote.
Even if you want to use the old school way without slipstreaming it takes about 1.5h on my fairly slow boxes...
http://hardforum.com/showpost.php?p=1041595759&postcount=12
//Danne

Some of us also have 30+ programs to reinstall and have to find those files online and download them. It takes time and bandwidth to download 50+ gigs and install tens upon tens of programs.

For a minor upgrade its easier and better to just clone. Generally uninstalling drivers is not hard unless you have a lap top. IE going from a ASUS to an Alienware laptop requires a fresh install...desktops have like 5 drives lol.

Pulled the trigger.

Samsumg 850 Pro 256gb - $143
Toshiba 4tb HDD - $130
3-Pack SATA Cables - $8
Total (w/tax & 2-day shipping) - $294

So nice coming in under max budget ($400) and nailing my preferred budget ($300).

Thanks for the help all! If I have any trouble getting it set up I'm sure I'll be back. I have my OS key (should still work b/c mobo is the same), and I have an ISO somewhere for Windows. I'll get that put onto a flash drive and hopefully things will go smoothly.

Cheers!

you can find a link to download windowws online. I think notebookreview has a page with all the links. I don't know if this forum has a thread with all the official windows download links.
 
As an Amazon Associate, HardForum may earn from qualifying purchases.
So, you have no idea what I just wrote.
Even if you want to use the old school way without slipstreaming it takes about 1.5h on my fairly slow boxes...
http://hardforum.com/showpost.php?p=1041595759&postcount=12
//Danne

this is the app I use,
https://www.paragon-software.com/technologies/components/migrate-OS-to-SSD/
it says it aligns the partition if needed, is that what you are referring to when you said alignment?

I have a lot of programs and updates installed apparently, and it's been almost 6 years since I installed Windows on these machines
3770K Main Rig
installed%20programs.jpg


4790K Garage PC
installed%20programs%20x100.jpg
 
Last edited:
Back
Top